Series B Sustainable Food & Agriculture Funders

Astanor Ventures is an impact investor that transforms the agrifood system by fostering innovation from "soil and sea to gut." They operate two complementary investment strategies - Astanor Venture for early-stage companies and Astanor Growth for scaling businesses across the entire agrifood value chain. Their mission centers on building a more resilient planet by investing at the intersection of planetary and human health, using food and agricultural systems as primary levers for change. They support ambitious entrepreneurs developing globally scalable solutions capable of driving systemic change, reconnecting planetary and human health through better nutrition and sustainable farming practices. As a global leader in impact investing, Astanor plays a crucial role in financing and scaling systemic disruption needed to reach ambitious targets set by the Paris Agreement and UN SDGs. With offices across Europe and the US, they demonstrate that there is no trade-off between return and impact - the more successful their portfolio businesses become, the greater the positive impact on both people and the planet.

Icehouse Ventures is a New Zealand venture capital firm backing Kiwi founded companies with the potential to scale into global markets. The platform traces its roots to Ice Angels, launched in 2003 as New Zealand’s first angel investment network. It raised its first fund in 2013 and formally became Icehouse Ventures in 2019, when Simplicity KiwiSaver, Jarden, and Sir Stephen Tindall’s K1W1 joined as shareholders. Today, Icehouse Ventures manages a range of investment vehicles spanning pre seed through pre IPO, supported by a co investor network of more than 3,000 investors. The firm says it has invested more than $800 million across more than 390 Kiwi founded companies. Its portfolio includes some of New Zealand’s better known technology companies, including Halter, Crimson Education, Sharesies, Partly, Hnry, Dawn Aerospace, Tracksuit, Tradify, Ethique, Basis, Fuel50, and Spalk, alongside international investments such as Wayve, Substack, and Nuro. Growth Fund III is currently being marketed as an open investment vehicle. Icehouse Ventures is a generalist technology investor rather than a dedicated climate fund, but sustainability is part of its broader investment framework. The firm publishes a Responsible Investment Policy aligned with the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, and Principal Bex Gidall leads both the Arc Fund and Sustainable Technologies Fund. Its climate and impact related portfolio includes companies such as Neocrete, which develops additives designed to reduce cement use in concrete, and Ethique, a solid personal care brand focused on reducing packaging waste.

Prosper Global Ventures is the early-stage impact investing and venture-building platform of Prosper Global, the global development organization formerly known as Mercy Corps. The platform was founded in 2015 as Mercy Corps Ventures and now operates as a family of funds backing founders whose technologies help people and markets withstand climate and economic disruption. Its Resilient Future Thesis is organized around three connected areas: adaptive agriculture and food systems, inclusive climate fintech, and climate-smart technologies. The team invests primarily across Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, prioritizing founders who understand the communities they serve and businesses that can scale across a region or globally. Earlier Fund I activity also included Southeast Asia. Prosper Global’s current Ventures page reports 61 early-stage companies supported, $753 million in follow-on capital catalyzed, and 46.3 million customers reached across 90 countries. Its 2025 impact report says 83% of portfolio companies had raised follow-on capital and 46% had at least one woman co-founder. These are Prosper Global Ventures’ reported portfolio figures, not independent impact measurements. The platform combines equity investment with pilots, technical assistance, impact measurement, partnerships, and post-investment support. Representative investments made under the Mercy Corps Ventures name include Pula, which provides agricultural insurance and advisory products for smallholder farmers; Floodbase, which develops flood-risk data and analysis; Wasoko, a last-mile commerce and financing platform for small retailers; AgriAku, an agricultural input marketplace; Ejara, an inclusive savings and investment platform; and Verqor, an agri-fintech platform serving farmers in Mexico. Prosper Global Ventures is embedded within Prosper Global’s humanitarian and development network, giving portfolio companies potential pathways to test products with communities affected by climate volatility, financial exclusion, fragile food systems, and infrastructure gaps. The venture platform is associated with Scott Onder, its co-founder and senior investment leader, while Tjada D’Oyen McKenna leads the parent organization as CEO.

Systemiq Capital backs early-stage founders who are rewriting the physical economy: how we grow and process food, invent materials, move people and goods, price climate risk, and restore damaged natural systems. The fund is Europe-based and works closely with the wider Systemiq systems-change practice, which gives it an unusual vantage point on markets, policy, and corporate demand. The partnership model is built around early market adoption. Capital is only part of the offer. Founders also get introductions into corporate buyers, policy networks, and later-stage investors who understand transition markets. That matters in climate tech, where the first customers are often industrial or public-sector actors, not consumer apps. Fund I launched in 2018, deployed about $30 million, and produced multiple exits. Fund II targets about $200 million after a reported $70 million first close, and continues the same "capital for systems change" mandate. Core themes stay consistent: sustainable food and materials, clean transport, climate intelligence and finance, and climate restoration (including removals and biodiversity-linked work). For directory readers, Systemiq Capital is useful when a company needs more than a generic climate VC. If the product only works when industry rules, procurement, or infrastructure shift, this is a firm that underwrites that complexity on purpose.

Wavemaker Impact is Southeast Asia's climate-tech venture builder, co-founding startups with proven entrepreneurs to cut emissions at regional scale. Launched in 2021 as part of the Wavemaker Partners platform and led by founding partner Marie Cheong, the firm targets the region's largest emission sources in agriculture, energy, industry, built environment, and transport, with a long-term goal of helping reduce 10% of the global carbon budget by 2035.

World Fund is a European climate tech venture firm that backs founders building the technologies Europe needs to compete and to cut emissions at industrial scale. The firm is based in Berlin, with a wider footprint across Munich, Cologne, and Amsterdam, and it concentrates on deep tech in energy, industry, and food and agriculture. Unlike broad climate funds that stretch from consumer brands to carbon software, World Fund is explicit about hard technology and measurable decarbonization. Every opportunity is assessed through a Climate Performance Potential lens: can this product cut meaningful emissions if it scales, and can it win commercially in a real market? That framing is meant to keep climate impact and financial performance on the same page, not in separate decks. The founding partners include Daria Saharova, Danijel Višević, Tim Schumacher, and Craig Douglas. The first fund closed around €300 million, reported as one of the largest debut climate VC funds in Europe, with room for roughly 25 to 30 core investments and substantial follow-on capital. The team has been public about reserving a large share of the fund for later rounds, because European climate companies often struggle to bridge the Series B gap. Portfolio companies sit in the physical economy as much as in software. Examples that show the range include battery recycling (Cylib), industrial and building energy (Enerkii, aedifion, ecoworks), alternative proteins and food tech (Planet A Foods, Juicy Marbles, ENOUGH), and deep tech such as IQM Quantum Computers and Space Forge. For founders, the useful signal is simple: World Fund wants durable technology businesses with climate math that survives scrutiny.